Stormful Waltz
by Another Winter
Summary: Just because something seems logical, that doesn’t make it right. The story of the early days of Wammy’s House.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: Hello and welcome to my second **_**Death Note**_** fanfiction. Thank you very much for dropping by! When I set out to start another fanfic I had this idea in my mind that I wanted to deal with B in a much more direct way than in "Dust and Mirrors", but was unsure as to how to go about it since B is such a difficult character. I eventually decided that half the charm of B is seeing how others react to him. Just try to imagine B eating jam without Naomi there to be disgusted by it! Taking that into account I chose a third person voice rather than the first person that originally seemed so tempting. I think the result feels a little flat, but hopefully I can get used to it and spice things up. The title of this fanfic is borrowed from the name of a Kaizers Orchestra song. Here's hoping I don't get my butt sued by my favorite band… Okay, I've rambled way too long. This author note is practically longer than the chapter itself. Please enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own **_**Death Note**_** or any of the characters used in this story.**

Trees and mailboxes flew by in time with the gentle music flowing from Roger's car radio, but despite the tranquil surroundings, he just couldn't loosen his grip on the steering wheel. He desperately wished he could back out, but things were already in motion and he had already given his word.

When Quillsh Wammy had come to him asking him to be a part of his newest philanthropic project, he had jumped at the idea, sure that it would offer him a blissful distraction from his newly obtained widower status. He had no idea what he was getting into.

_Philanthropy should remain just that, Quillsh. Once your own motives get mixed in, it is bound to fail._

But of course he wouldn't know that. His background was in engineering. He was the kind of person who could conceptualize and build with minimal effort, but could never even begin to fathom the subtle nuances of business.

That's where Roger came in.

Neither of them liked to look at the well-being of children as a business, but when you boiled it down, there _were_ funds to manage, facilities to maintain, and employees to supervise.

On top of that, though, there was L, the young prodigy who had consumed Quillsh Wammy's very being. That's what this was all about. That boy had practically become his son.

When your son is a baseball player, you go to the game and cheer. When your son is a world-renowned detective, you don a trench coat and deliver his faceless messages.

Now Quillsh wanted back-ups for that force of justice he had raised, and in theory it seemed very logical. When someone's mere existence drops the world's crime level, you can't very well just let the game end when he throws down his glove. No, there had to be someone to take his place.

That's what didn't sit right with Roger.

In his time as a professor at the university where he and Quillsh Wammy had met, Roger had seen all kinds of young adults. The most unfortunate were always the ones who were taking classes only to live up to their parents' expectations. They strove and strove and strove, but in the end they had to face the realization that no matter what diploma they had, they could never be good enough. If that kind of stress destroyed college students, what would it do to children?

Roger sighed and turned the car into the gravel parking lot of a small building.

Regardless of how he felt, there was no backing out now.

-------------------------------------------------------

"Ah, Mr. Ruvie! So glad you made it here alright. Did you get lost at all? I know my directions weren't the best."

"I got here just fine," Roger said with a smile. "Thank you."

"That's good," the woman said with a sigh of relief. "We're just about ready to go on this end. I just need you to fill out the last of the paperwork."

Roger nodded and followed the woman into the main office of the tiny orphanage.

"There is something we wanted you to know about the boy. I already told your boss, but we felt it would be best if you knew too."

The woman removed her glasses and breathed on them.

"He seems to be suffering from some extreme grief."

"That's to be expected," Roger said, watching the woman finish cleaning her glasses.

"Yes, but this borders on the unhealthy. He keeps drawing pictures of his parents with these odd, red halos above their heads and labeling them with their full names. When we ask him what it's about, he just says it's how they looked when they died. Now, we're sure you've got a wonderful psychologist over there as well, but I wanted to give you the heads up anyway."

Roger hesitated for a moment before producing another fake smile.

"I appreciate it."

------------------------------------------------

After the paperwork was completed, Roger stepped out into the hallway again to find that his newest ward was already waiting for him.

The boy looked to be about ten years of age with wide, piercing eyes and black hair. Roger nearly gasped. It was like looking at a younger version of L. The only difference was the shape of the boy's face. Even though L was only a teenager, he had already acquired a kind of sickly gauntness which this boy was lacking.

The child stood and stared at Roger with a very rigid and untrusting posture before picking up his suitcase and walking quietly to the door.

On the car ride back to Wammy's House, Roger did his best to ignore the boy's eyes drilling into the back of his head, and wondered how the rest of the staff were doing with their assigned pick-ups.

"Where are we going?" the boy asked after a good hour of silence.

"Wammy's House," Roger replied gently, glad that driving gave him an excuse not to make eye contact. "Your new home in Winchester."

"How come I couldn't stay where I was?"

It took Roger a moment to come up with an answer.

"You have special talents. Living at Wammy's House will give you the opportunity to develop them."

Roger watched in the rearview mirror as the boy turned his head to look out the window.

"What's this sticker you gave me?" he asked after another brief silence.

"That's your nametag. So you can introduce yourself to the other children when we arrive. Everyone will be wearing one. Even me."

Roger attempted a reassuring smile and reached across the dashboard to grab a white rectangle with his own name printed on it.

"I think you made a mistake," the boy said. "Mine only has one letter on it."

Roger winced.

"Th-that's not a mistake," the older man stammered while still trying to maintain his air of encouragement. "That's what you will be called while at Wammy's House."

"B? But that's not even a name. Why can't I be called what I always have?"

"It's just a safety precaution. You'll get used to it after awhile, I'm sure."

The boy sat up straight and grabbed onto the back of Roger's seat as if someone had just jabbed him with a hot iron.

"But I don't want to get used to it!" he half yelled, half gasped. "I want to keep my real name!"

Roger glanced over his shoulder nervously.

"Please stay in your seat."

The boy glared at Roger and began to cry very forcefully without returning to the sitting position Roger requested.

"This isn't right! I don't want to be a stupid letter!"

Roger tried to keep his worried eyes on the road and swallowed down the dread rising in his throat.

Raising these children to be L was going to be like teaching them to dance on a rainy rooftop. Some of them would slip and be washed away with the water. Some of them would be struck down by lightning. And those that did succeed? They would never be able to dry themselves of the cold, cold rain.

_I hope you know what you're doing, Quillsh…_

**Author's Note: Yes, things were pretty Roger-centered in this chapter, but I plan on switching focus as certain events happen. I figured it might be fun to take a look at him too since he's usually just a background character. Oh, and by the way: red halos = zeros. Thank you for reading. Please leave a review if you enjoyed or have any ideas for improvement. **


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: Hello again! It's time for chapter two! Thank you to all who reviewed and all who read. This time around the focus drifts over to young B and his meeting with A. Very little actually happens though. I just wanted to explore some aspects of the two boys' personalities and get myself familiar with them. I think I may have let A take a little of B's thunder here, but I wanted to get stuff about A set in stone early on since… well, you know… **

**Disclaimer: I do not own **_**Death Note**_** or any of the characters used in this story. I also do not own the song "You Are My Sunshine", although it my already be public domain. I don't really know.**

B continued to scream from the back seat of Roger's car as it pulled through the gates of Wammy's House. Manicured lawns and patches of shady trees passed by the windows, but neither of the car's occupants seemed to notice. Roger was too absorbed in keeping the car under control in the midst of B's agonizing tantrum, and B was too absorbed in throwing said tantrum.

By the time the car came to a stop, B's throat was sore and Roger was developing a migraine. Nevertheless, the two piled out of the vehicle and stood in the middle of the driveway staring at the spectacle before them. It was like some kind of dreadful hybrid between a refugee camp and a bowl of alphabet soup. Children were scattered across the front lawn of the orphanage, each with a respective single-letter nametag and a small entourage of bags. Some of them ran and played, some of them sat and stared, and some of them just cried as if their lungs might burst.

Roger sighed uncomfortably and began to walk toward the ill-fated crowd, hoping that B would follow.

B watched the old man, but remained where he was. He sat down on top of his suitcase and tried to control his breathing, which still came in shallow, sobbing gasps.

What kind of outrageous place was this?

"Are you alright?" asked a voice from behind B.

The black-haired child whirled around faster than a tornado and nearly lost his balance, but before he could topple, a small, pale hand reached out and grabbed his shoulder. B looked at the hand and jumped backwards, brushing it away violently.

"Don't touch me!" he yelled in a voice fractured from too much crying.

The owner of the hand, a boy about one year older than B with short, blonde hair and glasses, looked at him in utter horror.

"I-I'm sorry… I just thought…"

"Don't. Touch. Me," B repeated menacingly.

The other boy froze like a deer in the headlights and continued to stare with saucer eyes.

"Don't look at me either. Go away."

"You look sad though…"

Though the boy was older, his speech and mannerisms were clearly very childish, as if his mind had stopped developing the day he became an orphan.

B met the boy's gaze, causing the other child to go rigid with unease. The blonde quickly averted his eyes and began to kick at the gravel of the driveway. The corners of B's mouth flickered with the ghost of a smile. Seeing someone more afraid than he was raised his spirits a little bit.

"What's your name?" B asked.

"A," the boy replied without hesitation, as though the letter really was printed on his birth certificate.

"What's your _real_ name?"

"I'm not supposed to tell anybody that…" A answered, lowering his voice to a whisper. "It's not safe."

B rose to his feet in an unsettlingly rapid motion and scowled down at A, who was easily half a foot shorter. He didn't need the boy's voice to learn what he wanted to know. He glanced above A's head and read the label that floated there. As he did so, he could not help but notice the strangely low number that accompanied it.

"Are you sick?" B asked candidly.

"What? Uh, no. Why? Do I look sick?" A seemed to be genuinely worried about B's perceived observation. "I did feel a little weird on the car ride here. Like a bit dizzy. You don't think there's something wrong with my brain, do you?"

B's eyelid twitched as he looked at the panic-stricken boy.

"Wrong… with your brain?"

"Yeah, like an aneurysm. Or a stroke. Am I speaking funny at all? Does my face look okay?"

B didn't know what to make of this. He had never met a child with such a strange medical fixation.

"Your face is fine."

A didn't seem convinced and turned to the window of Roger's car to check his reflection. As he was checking it, he saw B's nametag which had been left on the car seat inside.

"Is your name B?"

"No," B snapped. "But I guess that's what everyone's going to call me."

"Nice to meet you then, B."

B frowned at his blonde-haired counterpart, suddenly annoyed with his sickening fear and innocence.

A mistook the frown for concern and gave B a weak smile.

"Hey, why don't we go see the other kids? Or maybe you're hungry? I've still got a peanut butter and jelly sandwich in my bag if you want a piece."

B suddenly realized just how empty his stomach was and let his hunger win out over his annoyance.

"Sure. I guess I'll have a piece."

A unzipped the bag sitting a few feet away and pulled out a sandwich wrapped in cellophane. He tore away the clear material and ripped the sandwich in half.

B accepted the half-sandwich and bit into it eagerly.

The minute it touched his tongue he grimaced in disgust and held the food item out in front of him, letting it dangle from between his thumb and index finger.

"What is this?" he spat angrily, causing A to flinch.

"Peanut butter and jelly…?"

"No. This is bread. Bread with a thin layer of jelly. And it's not even grape!"

"It's strawberry…"

"Where's the peanut butter?"

"I don't like peanut butter on my peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Lots of kids are allergic to it. And allergies can develop at any time. What if I go into anaphylactic shock?"

B stared at A in furious disbelief.

"Then why the heck do you even bother to call it a 'peanut butter and jelly' sandwich?"

A looked hurt at B's reaction to his food offering.

"I don't know… I'm sorry…"

B sighed and shoved the sandwich back into A's hands.

"Come on. Let's just go see what's happening over on the lawn."

The two boys melded into the sea of young humanity and watched as adults scrambled around trying to keep track of all the children. They appeared to be ushering them into the building two at a time.

It was Roger himself who finally addressed B and A.

"Are you feeling any better, B?" Roger asked.

B looked up at Roger and nodded solemnly.

Roger hid his discomfort and handed the two boys a pair of keys.

"It's good that you two found each other. You're going to be roommates."

The old man forced a smile.

A and B looked at each other before following Roger into the building.

Once all the clothes had been put into drawers and the sheets spread across mattresses, A began to unpack his final bag while B stared out the window. He was still puzzling over A's low numbers and frustrating health fears when he heard faint, tinkling music that caused him to turn his head.

He saw A hugging a pastel yellow teddy bear to his chest. It looked very worn and had a turn key in its back which caused it to play a music box rendition of "You Are My Sunshine" when wound. A clung to the toy like his very life depended on it.

"What is that?"

"This is the bear my mom gave me," A replied, still hugging it. "Well, actually, I gave it to her when she was in the hospital, but she let me have it back."

"The hospital? Did your mom die in a hospital?" B asked without any regard to sensitivity.

A looked at the floor and tried blink back the beginning of a tear.

"…Yeah. She got really sick. The doctors tried to help her, but…"

B studied A's sorrowful body language with curiosity. Suddenly the health fears seemed to make a little more sense.

"She was in so much pain, B… I know people always talk about how brave sick people are, but… she was in so much pain… she was so scared…"

A's face contorted into a mask of despair as he broke down into hysterical sobbing and grasped the bear so tightly that it seemed like it was going to break in half.

An unfamiliar feeling of pity shot through B's heart. He wondered what it must have been like for A not to know when his mother's last breaths would be. He must have been forced to watch her wither away for months on end, never sure if he would miss his chance to say goodbye. Trying to imagine that kind of uncertainty was strange and frightening to B, who had known the dates of his parents' deaths all his life.

B crouched down beside his new roommate and wrapped his arms around him in an awkward, childlike hug. He didn't know what to say and the embrace was quite uncomfortable for him, so it lasted only a few quiet seconds.

A took a small amount of comfort in the gesture and turned the key on the back of his teddy bear once more, allowing himself to be taken back to a horrible, wonderful time in his memory where the desolate sounds of hospital machinery mingled with the sound of his mother's yet unsilenced voice.

**Author's Note: Though the tone in this chapter is not exactly light, it's still not as dark as it's going to get. The boys do not have happy times ahead of them, and neither does Roger, who will get more "screentime" again soon enough. Thank you very much for reading. Please review if you have comments or suggestions. **


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note: Greetings fanfiction people! Chapter three is here. Thank you to my readers and reviewers. You bring me so many smiles. Sorry I was unable to get this posted last night… stupid life interfering with my fictional obsessions… Anyway, don't get too excited because today's installment is a little weak and filler-y. There's a small time jump as well. My aim was to give a tiny peek into just how brutal early Wammy's was while further examining the relationship between B and A. I know the bullying scene is a little cliché… Please forgive me.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own **_**Death Note**_** or any of the characters used in this story.**

Roger pulled a chart down from the highest shelf in his office and opened it with a sigh. It had been almost seven months since Wammy's House opened its doors and already things were starting to unravel.

The children that they had gathered were all brilliant in their own ways, but with great intelligence came all manner of other unwholesome qualities. Some of them were arrogant and had superiority complexes so strong that they viewed their peers as ants, others were quiet and withdrawn, speaking only to tell the staff in the mess hall what kind of soup they wanted with their meal, and then there were those who used their intelligence solely to torture and manipulate those they viewed as weaker. Roger worried for all the mentioned children, but the most upsetting students by far were the ones that could not be easily categorized. Students like B, who was as unpredictable as a string of winning lottery numbers, or A, who had the nervous heart of a cornered prey animal.

Roger longed to step in and help the unfortunate brood, but his instructions prevented it. Everyone working at Wammy's House had been given orders from Quillish Wammy himself to stay as uninvolved in the children's lives as possible. They were told to ignore the bullying and the anxiety and let the children work their way through the trials independently. This order was convenient enough for most of the staff, but maddening for Roger, who knew such anarchy was a bad idea.

He looked at the chart in his hands. This weeks rankings…

Every week the children were assessed based on their performance in classes, as well as more obscure factors, and the results were posted in the main hall for all to see. It established a brutal, almost pack-like hierarchy among the children which added to their already astronomical levels of stress.

Roger bowed his head, grabbed a box of thumbtacks, and headed for main hall, hoping futilely that maybe this week no one would see the demeaning list.

----------------------------------------

"Hey, Number Twelve," a gangly, brown-haired boy said maliciously. "Still studying? It's not doing you any good, you know."

A looked up from his book and shrunk into the library chair he was seated in.

"Hi, D…"

The taller boy snickered and repeated A's words in a high, mocking tone of voice.

"You're even lower on the list this week than you were before! How is it that you spend so much time buried in your textbooks, but still manage to be such a miserable failure?"

"I'm trying my best," A replied fearfully, running his fingers over the corner of his book. "Please leave me alone…"

"Apparently your best isn't good enough. Why'd they even let you in here?"

B watched the unfolding conflict from a study carrel across the room and gritted his teeth. He couldn't decide which was more aggravating: D's nauseating cruelty or A's inability to stand up to it. He slowly abandoned his chair and headed toward the other boys.

"What do you want, weirdo?" D demanded, leering at B as he approached.

"Good question."

D waited for B to elaborate, but was met with only silence and B's piercing eyes.

"Yeah?" D asked expectantly.

"Yep."

A sunk down further into his chair.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"Another good question."

D balled his fists and snarled at B.

"Cut the crap!"

B smiled.

"Are you upset?"

"No," D growled venomously. "I'm just wondering why some pathetic freak is wasting my time with nonsense."

B's smile widened.

"Oh good, then you know how A feels."

Both A and D's eyes widened at B's response, but for entirely different reasons.

"B…" A whispered apprehensively, begging his roommate not to say anything more.

B looked at A out of the corner of his eye and raised his hand to block a punch from D. The black-haired boy turned the block into a grab and gripped D's wrist tightly so that the bully could not pull his hand back.

D struggled helplessly to free himself, but could not escape B's ever tightening fingers.

"A," B said authoritatively. "Come here."

A blinked and hesitantly got to his feet.

"I want you to do something."

"Huh...?"

"Punch him."

"What?!"

"Punch D. Right in the stomach."

"I-I don't want to do that!"

"I know you don't. But you have to."

B was going to teach A to stand up for himself by any means possible. It was for the blonde's own good. A couldn't afford to lose any more numbers to bullying and constantly swooping in to rescue the boy was becoming tedious.

A's lip quivered as he looked from B's unreadable face to D's explicitly angry one.

"B, this isn't right… I don't want to do this…"

"You have to," B said again.

Tears started to fall from A's eyes as he inched toward the restrained bully. Cautiously he lifted his hand and threw a weak punch into the center of D's gut. The lack of force behind the punch rendered it almost unnoticeable, but B was satisfied with the action, and did nothing to stop A when he ran from the room crying afterwards.

Once A was safely out of earshot, B wrenched D's arm at a painful angle and threw him to the ground. He then began to thrash him with a series of forceful kicks to the ribs. The beating did not end until D rolled over and vomited.

"Glad to see I make you as nauseous as you make me," B stated matter-of-factly, delivering one final kick and turning to leave.

-----------------------------------------------

B returned to his room where he found A pacing back and forth across the same five feet of floor space. The blonde's face was pale as a ghost and shone with a thin layer of sweat.

"What are you doing?" B asked, avoiding the pacing grounds.

A looked desperately at B and wrung his hands in the front of his shirt as if trying to dry it of some invisible saturation.

"Get somebody. Quick, B."

"Why? What's going on?"

"I'm dying. Please get someone. One of the teachers. Please."

B looked above A's head and, though the numbers were lower than they had been a few months ago, A still had a fair amount of time left.

"You're not dying," B said, watching A move frantically across the floor.

"Yes I am. I can't breathe. Please, B."

"How are you talking to me if you can't breathe?"

A disregarded B's statement and began to wring his shirt more violently.

"My heart is beating out of my chest. I can't feel my fingers. I'm going to faint."

"A, I think this is all just in your head. You've got to calm down."

A tried to take some deep breaths, but wound up coughing on his own panic.

"I'm gonna die, B. I'm gonna die."

The blonde began to repeat the statement like a mantra and paced faster.

"Calm down," B said, actually starting to get a little unnerved by A's strange behavior. "When did this start?"

"When I got back to the room," A gasped. "Right after you made me punch D. Why did you make me punch D? I didn't want to punch him."

"That's not important," he replied, unwilling to come right out and say that he was trying to help him gain a backbone. "I think you just got upset about the conflict and misinterpreted your own anxiety. You'll be fine."

"I'm not fine. I'm dying. And I'm dying as a bully! I'm gonna go to Hell, B, and it's all your fault!"

A began to gasp even more pathetically as he attempted to hold back tears.

B stared at his mentally anguished roommate with confusion and an expanding share of anger. A should be thanking him for what he did! What was this?

"You did what you had to do."

"I did what you made me do!" A sobbed.

What an ungrateful…

"Well, it's done. Now, sit down and stop freaking out."

"But, I'm gonna die. I'm gonna die."

"You're not going to die!" B yelled angrily, looking at A's numbers again and wishing his statement were completely true. "Sit down and shut up or I'm leaving."

B didn't think it was possible for A to become any more panic stricken, but the proposition of B leaving the room managed to accomplish it.

"Don't leave. Please don't leave."

B considered leaving just on spite, but remained for reasons which he could not fully comprehend. It was an odd mixture of pity and fascination.

He leaned against his dresser and watched A have the remainder of his panic attack, hoping his roommate would eventually stop chanting the morbid mantra that his eyes knew to be true.

**Author's Note: Poor A! Panic attacks suck! Thank you all for reading and please leave a review if the fancy strikes you. New chapter coming soon. Here's the preview: unpleasantness. **


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note: Two updates in one day? I must be losing my mind! Obsession is an ugly thing folks… Just say no to **_**Death Note**_** before it's too late! But if you're reading this, then I guess it is already too late for you. Oh well! This chapter contains some morbid themes so reader discretion is advised. Thank you for reading and thank you to all who reviewed.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own **_**Death Note**_** or any of the characters used in this story.**

The following months found A in increasingly frequent states of panic, and each time he would think the psychological anguish was a different emergency. B had counted over thirty imagined heart attacks, twenty-seven strokes, and countless manifestations of obscure diseases a third year med student wouldn't even know about. After a while B didn't feel bad anymore. Whenever he noticed A starting to get nervous, he would just leave the room, regardless of A's pleas.

Soon A began to avoid places where he had experienced particularly bad panic attacks and did nothing but study. He lost weight and got little sleep, leaving B to cover his head with a pillow every night just to block out the light from A's desk lamp and the sound of A's mutterings.

The blonde stopped smiling and ate very little, always making sure to inspect his food before putting it in his mouth. The only thing he found safe anymore was the strawberry jam from his ludicrous peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

Despite B's exasperation with A's behavior, he could not help but feel curious and a little sad as the boy's numbers neared their end. They had dwindled so fast. Like watching time pass on a digital clock.

In what B knew to be A's final days, A started to act very differently. His mood brightened and he actually started to talk to people that he had once been terrified of. The odd change in behavior allowed B to spend more time around his roommate, but brought his curiosity to a near burning level. It was not until the day before A's death that B figured out just what was going on.

--------------------------------------

B turned over in his bed when he heard a rustling from the other side of the room and opened his eyes ever so slightly to watch A creep through the darkness. He heard the opening and closing of a desk drawer and pretended to be asleep as A passed by him to slip out the door.

The numbers were so low. B had never seen numbers that close to zero. It was almost like seeing that faint glow in the sky before sunrise for the first time. He had seen night, and he had seen day, but never what was in-between.

Though he knew what was about to happen, B did nothing to try to stop it. There was nothing that could stop it. The numbers never lied.

With a groan, he turned over and went back to sleep.

A little over an hour later, B awoke again with a terribly dry mouth. As he swung his legs off the side of the bed, he briefly remembered why A wasn't in the room, but disregarded it to begin his trek to the bathroom in the hall.

B could almost taste the cool tap water in his mouth when he pushed open the bathroom door, but stopped cold in his thirsty tracks when he saw what separated him from the sink.

His roommate lay sprawled across the white tile floor in a puddle of thick, red blood. His hand was outstretched and his face was frozen in a grey mask of horror, as if at the last minute he had changed his mind and reached out to anyone, anything for help. A glaring zero floated above his head, looking uniform next to all the blood.

B took a step backwards and clasped his hands over his mouth.

What the hell!

Is this what it really looked like?

He had not been present for his parents' deaths so all he knew of was dwindling numbers and placid looking corpses in caskets. It had made it easy to take an indifferent viewpoint of the mortality that surrounded him.

But this…

This chilled him to the bone.

He pictured A's reactions to the false deaths he had dreamed up for himself, and then cringed to imagine what the boy must have been thinking in his final seconds, when the last numbers ticked away.

Why had A decided to do this? Of course death must have seemed blissful compared to the fearful half-life he led, but didn't he realize that in order to be dead he had to die?

Stupid, stupid A…

B looked at A's hand again. He looked at the wound on its wrist and the blood smeared over its fingers.

Who did he think was going to help him?

B?

Had he wanted B to stop him?

B couldn't stop him. The numbers were set in stone.

The black-haired boy crept up to the corpse before him, crouched down, and grasped its cold, rigid hand in his own.

"There was nothing I could have done," he whispered defensively to the dead boy. "You just don't understand the numbers, A."

B pulled his hand away and shivered when he saw the layer of blood that had been left behind. He tried to wipe the blood on his pajama shirt, but succeeded only in making more stains. Then he ran his hands under the faucet and scrubbed compulsively at his skin in a Shakespearean manner, working himself into an almost A-like panic. The frenzied ablution lasted for a good ten minutes before B looked up into the mirror and went disturbingly still.

"Wait here," B said to the corpse behind him, unaware of the irony of his statement. "I'll be right back."

B ran down the hall and back into his room where he grabbed the teddy bear from A's perfectly made bed.

He returned to the funereal lavatory and stared down at the body.

"This will make it better. I've got your bear."

He set the toy down next to A's chest and pulled the boy's blood-drenched arm over it in an inappreciable post mortum hug.

"There you go," he said with a smile inappropriate for the moment. "Now you won't be alone."

He turned the key on the stuffed animal's back and walked out of the room, trailing A's blood onto the hallway carpet.

-----------------------------------------------

Roger blinked his tired eyes and nodded with exhaustion. Just a few more papers to fill out and then he could sleep…

He hated late nights like this, but sometimes it had to be done. There was something to be said for the quiet of the early morning, though, and the rain pattering against the window had an almost soothing rhythm.

It was quite surprising for the old man when he heard a knock on his door at such a late hour.

"Come in," he called, wondering who it could be.

The door creaked open slowly and B stumbled in, tripping over his pajama pants. Roger's heart nearly stopped when he noticed the boy's gruesome appearance. Was he covered in blood?

"A is dead," B said detachedly before turning around and leaving as suddenly as he had come.

Roger went numb and the pen he had been writing with clattered to the desk.

----------------------------------------------

After the ambulance had been called and the bathroom blocked off, Roger found himself punching a number into his phone with trembling fingers.

"Hello?" asked a scrambled voice on the other end.

"I want out," Roger said, trying to control the anger in his voice.

"Roger?"

"Yes. I want out. I do not want to be a part of this anymore."

"What do you mean?"

"A child is dead, Qui-Watari. A twelve-year-old boy is dead. He killed himself. A twelve-year-old boy killed himself tonight."

"…Oh my God."

"'Oh my God'? Is that all you can say? Do you even see what you're doing to these kids?"

"I-I never could have expected--"

"Of course. You were too busy thinking about L. Well, let me tell you something you've probably never heard: the world does not revolve around L. These are human lives, not floppy disks. I'm not going to be a part of this anymore."

There was a moment of awkward silence.

"You can't leave, Roger."

"I can and I am."

"No. You can't. You signed into this. You have been granted access to too much information. Your leaving would pose a great danger to L, to the world."

"Did you hear anything I just said?" Roger roared.

"You cannot leave."

Roger paused a moment to consider what his friend was telling him. He felt like a disloyal member of a mafia family being fitted for cement shoes.

"You have damned these kids. You and L and your crazy version of justice."

"Don't say anything you can't take back. Now we just know what works and what doesn't. We won't make the same mistakes again."

Quillish Wammy hung up the phone and left Roger to seethe at an unfeeling dial tone.

Roger set down the handset and looked out the window. The rain had picked up considerably and the water poured off the roof in buckets, splashing noisily to the ground.

**Author's Note: o.O I told you this chapter would contain unpleasantness! Thank you for reading though. **


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Note: Hello, and sorry for not updating yesterday. Hopefully the two-for-one on my last update makes up for it. Thank you to everyone who is following along and to everyone who has left reviews. This chapter is a bit short, but it is basically a bridge so I'm hoping that's okay. Enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own **_**Death Note**_** or any of the characters used in this story.**

News of A's death spread through the orphanage like wildfire, but as no one had any real information yet, the facts were skewed and gossipy. Many kids had chosen to entertain the notion that B had killed A, and given B's odd behavior before the incident, it was almost believable. When one took into account B's downright bizarre behavior since it had happened, it was difficult to believe anything else.

B rarely looked anyone in the eye anymore, choosing instead to watch the area just above their head. The walls of his room were plastered with drawings of figures bearing red halos, and his peers often found him singing softly to himself and weeping. The answers he gave in classes began to make less and less sense until teachers stopped calling on him altogether. He even took to eating A's beloved jam, hoping that he might find the same wretched safety in it that his roommate had.

One day a series of agonizing wails tore through the halls on the east side of the building and everyone came running to find B doubled over on the floor of the science classroom clutching his face. Bottles of unpronounceable chemicals sat at his feet, most of them bearing brightly colored warning labels telling their users to avoid eye contact.

"I don't want to see them anymore!" he shrieked over and over, thrashing at anyone brave enough to come close to him. "I don't want to see them!"

Finally a woman, who taught literature to the older students, grabbed him and forced him to the sink to flush out his eyes, figuring this was one of those situations where it was best to break the rules.

B tried to fight her off, but she had a lot of grit for a middle-aged English teacher. He flailed helplessly as his face was shoved beneath the faucet, filling his nose with water and causing his eyes to burn even more. While attempting to send a backwards kick into the woman's chest, B lost his balance on the wet floor and slipped. His head hit the edge of the sink with a sickening crack, but he did not lose consciousness.

By now, most of the horrified bystanders had fallen silent, no one daring to comment on the scene before them. The only sounds were the pathetic coughs and blood-curdling howls emanating from B's throat.

The woman eventually got a firm grip on B's arms and let him up once she thought his eyes had been sufficiently cleansed of the chemicals. Locks of bedraggled hair hung in his face, giving him the appearance of a half-drowned cat.

The teacher had no idea what to do with the flailing boy and decided to bring him to Roger's office.

She deposited him on a chair just outside the office and left very quickly, informing B that she had a class to teach. Her class wasn't for two hours. She just didn't want to be caught interfering.

B was too exhausted to run, and as he sat there, his eyes burning and his clothes soaked, he watched the grandfather clock across the hall as its pendulum swung from side to side. He wished he could crawl into the large part of the clock where the weights and gears were. He wished he could just go in there and hide forever. If he were inside the clock, he wouldn't see the face. He wouldn't see the numbers.

His musings were interrupted by the sound of two voices from within Roger's office. B cocked his head at noise and crept closer to the door to hear.

--------------------------------------------------

"Watari said you had something you wanted to tell me?" Roger asked.

"Yes," replied a scrambled voice.

Roger cringed. He didn't like talking to L as he wasn't sure what to make of him. Was he the master or the puppet? The genius or the fool?

"I want you to tell the children about me."

"What?"

"They should know what they're striving for. Taking A's tragedy into account, I figure he was suffering from a feeling of futility. If the other children know their goal, they are sixty-percent less likely to feel that way."

"L, do you-"

"Please, Roger. I believe this to be the best thing for everyone. I know you are angry with us right now, but please trust my judgment."

Did this teenager know what he was saying? Could he comprehend consequences in any way other than a flow chart of outcomes and strategies?

And Wammy… Was this really L's idea or just one of Quillish's plans being conveyed through L to obtain a better reaction?

"Understood," Roger said hopelessly, unable to phrase a better response. "They will be informed."

"Thank you, Roger. I know this will be for the best."

-----------------------------------------------

B strained to hear more, but it seemed the conversation was over.

Who was this L?

Why had he been kept a secret?

What did he mean by "goal"?

B's head swam with questions and he was in no mood to wait for answers. He kicked open the door and stormed into the office.

"Who is L?" B asked with a chilling calm that contrasted sharply with his actions.

Roger gawked at B.

"B, what are you-"

"Who is he?"

Despite his voice, the boy looked absolutely distraught and his bloodshot eyes and wet hair gave him an even more frightening appearance.

"Are you oka-"

"Who is L?"

Roger paused before trying to explain.

"L is a detective. He works with some of the world's top investigative bureaus to solve difficult crimes."

It sounded so simple laid out in plain words like that. One would never guess at the sheer number of tangled roots hidden beneath such a statement.

"What does that have to do with us?"

"You are here to learn… how to be L."

B's mind was racing too violently to pick up on the purposely simple wording and badly hidden condescension in Roger's voice. He fired question after question at the man, repeating some of them several times without realizing it. By the time he was satisfied, almost two hours had passed.

B liked the idea of this L…

L was strong. L never doubted himself. L was always right.

L saw the world objectively.

L would not be fazed by the numbers.

That was it. That was the only way.

If B became just like L, if he won this contest, then his pain would go away.

He could go back to how he was before. Before A ruined everything.

He could go back to not caring.

B smiled for the first time in days and let a little chuckle escape from his mouth. L was the answer, the ultimate anodyne.

**Author's Note: The thing about putting all your hope into one goal… it sets you up for disappointment. It's a good thing everyone in this story is perfectly adjusted and can handle disappointment well… oh wait… Next chapter soon. Thank you for reading! **


	6. Chapter 6

**Author's Note: Okay. I finally revised this. A thousand thanks to Toph13139 and their great and helpful suggestions. The main plot points of the chapter are pretty much the same, but some things have been embellished or re-worded. So if you have already read, don't feel the need to re-read in order to grasp what is happening later on in the story. Thank you for putting up with me for this long, everyone. Your support, reviews, and interest mean the world. **

**Disclaimer: I do not own _Death Note_ or any of the characters used in this story.**

As the seasons flew by, Roger watched the landscape outside his office window change ever so subtly, and so did he watch B change. The boy had taken a decided turn for the better after hearing of L, performing well in class again and interacting with his peers in an almost normal way. He had his moments of peculiarity, but nothing like before.

Roger managed to strike up a kind of half-friendship with B, whom he saw rather frequently because of orders from L. The detective had taken a special interest in him, often requesting that he participate in problem solving tests the other children did not. B passed all of them with flying colors, and even answered a few questions in ways that genuinely impressed L.

L had become much more active in the affairs of Wammy's House after giving his first order, and Roger was actually almost pleased with the result. Every suggestion the prodigy made managed to improve the orphanage in some way. He guessed wisdom had come with age: L was now in his early twenties.

Following along with the goal of the institution became much easier with L behind the wheel, and seeing B's success actually made Roger feel good about what he was doing on some days. Maybe there was still hope for these children.

B reveled in hearing about L's approval of him, and often used the opportunities to steal more information from Roger. He found that if he phrased questions just right, he could learn more than what Roger intended to tell him. Employing these methods, he had not only managed to ascertain L's brilliant patterns of deduction, but a lot of other, more personal information. How L sat, what L wore…

The day of B's greatest achievement came just around his seventeenth birthday, when he went to Roger's office for a scheduled meeting. Roger emerged from his office to call B in, but fumbled with his name for a moment upon seeing him. Much like the owner of a large number of dogs, who cannot remember which one he is yelling at for tearing up the curtains, and rattles off all their names until he gets to the right one. He had started to call B, L. Roger laughed it off, wondering how he could make such a silly slip, but B took it straight to heart.

He was getting closer to his goal. Soon he wouldn't have to hide his fear and despair any longer, he would become L and gain the powerful, indifferent worldview he longed for.

As if Roger's botched designation wasn't good enough, B received a pack of L's notes that day. He was to study them and gain a better insight into L's methods. He would not just study them. He would worship them.

He read the papers every morning before breakfast and every night after lights out. They traveled everywhere with him, and it was not long before the other students took notice.

They looked at him with a mixture of jealousy and admiration, all the while wondering how someone who was once so hopelessly weird had become the number one student in the institution. Whenever he was approached, he played out his careful L act, displaying gentle smiles at the correct moments and considering everything they said with perfectly timed meditation. It was difficult for B, almost painful, but it was just something that had to be done.

Throughout it all, there was something that kept the other students from getting too close to him. A feeling that _something_ wasn't right. It was like a spooky porcelain doll displayed in the window of high-end toy shop. The taint was not obvious, but there was something in the doll's painted expression. A creature dressed in that kind of finery should not be wearing such an expression.

Regardless, there were still some who wished to outdo him. They would come to him asking for homework assistance with the intention of trying to steal what he knew the way B had stolen it from Roger. B knew what they were doing, and each time he brushed their subtle attacks off with a shield of L mannerisms and a belly-full of repressed hatred.

A group of such students confronted B one day as he sat crouched in a mess hall chair eating sugar cubes originally intended for coffee. The perfect picture of L.

"Hey there, B," a girl, who went by G, said colloquially, glancing at the small, mixed-gender group behind her.

"Hello, G," B said without looking up, trying to maintain as L-ish a manner as possible.

"We couldn't help but notice the papers you've been carrying around. They're from L, aren't they?"

"Yes."

"We were wondering if we could take a look. I mean, we're all trying to follow in his footsteps. It might be useful, right?"

She smiled innocently and gave a slight nervous giggle.

B struggled to keep his L act going when he heard her request. Never, ever had anyone been this disgustingly blatant before. _They_ wanted to see L's notes? The precious thoughts incarnate that had been granted to him alone? Were they crazy?

It took everything B had not to widen his eyes and begin screaming. He couldn't do that. He was L now. L didn't do that kind of thing.

"No, I'm sorry, G," B replied in a bored voice.

"Aw, why not?"

Because you're not even half worthy. L didn't choose you. You don't even know L's favorite food. L wouldn't choose any of you if he had a gun to his head.

"I'm still trying to figure out some information from them. Maybe later when I'm done."

"Get out of here, G," said a boy from the group behind her as he physically shoved the girl aside. "You make a crappy spokesperson."

It was D. He hadn't grown much since his days of torturing A, but his terrible attitude seemed to have tripled in size.

"Fork over the papers, B. It's not fair that you get an advantage."

B felt his composure starting to slip. He could not deal with this asshole right now.

"I would appreciate it if you would leave. I'm trying to study."

"We're not leaving until you give us what we want."

D took an intimidating step forward.

B fell out of his careful façade in that moment. The demeanor that it had taken years to perfect shattered like a dropped wine glass. He looked up with a quick, bird-like motion and turned his furious eyes on D.

"I'm not giving you anything."

Hearing his own tone of voice was both sickening and refreshing.

Some of the other members of the group flinched at B's noticeable change of tone, but D remained where he was.

The shorter male advanced on B and knocked the papers from his hands. They fluttered to the ground like wounded butterflies and settled at the feet of the other students. No one moved or attempted to pick them up.

D gave a sadistic, satisfied smile and knelt to begin the task.

B stood up out of his L crouch in a slow, deliberate motion that made him look like a transforming movie werewolf and stepped off the chair. He strode up to D and looked down at him.

"Knowledge is a dangerous thing, D. Are you sure you want to read the papers?"

"Stop trying at those stupid mindgames you played as a kid, B. No one's scared of you anymore."

The looks on his companions' faces seemed to indicate otherwise, but B paid it no mind.

D stood up holding a handful of papers triumphantly and smirked at B. The tall, dark-haired teen waited until D started reading to kneel down himself and pretend to pick up some of the remaining papers.

D took the bait just as predicted and attempted to kick B over, but B fell onto all fours and spun around to grab D's foot. It was a rather familiar scene.

"Did you learn anything?" B asked as he grasped D's ankle.

The other boy hopped pitifully to maintain his balance.

"I'm asking you a question, D. Did you learn anything?"

D whimpered, but made no reply.

B looked the boy straight in the eye and twisted his foot as far as he could until he heard cracking, and then just a little further for good measure. D fell to the ground cringing and sobbing.

"Looks like ignorance is even more dangerous than knowledge."

The stunned group helped D to his feet and gaped at B in horror.

"Wh-What was… that?" G stammered, her face pale and beginning to prickle with beads of sweat. "Why did you--"

"Shut up, G," B snapped. "You know very well what you were doing. At least D had the courage to openly exhibit his jealous defects. Although, if you had been just a little gutsier, it would have been you on the floor. Maybe you should consider yourself lucky that you're an ass-kissing little coward."

B bent down to pick up his papers for real this time, giving G a slight glance over his shoulder.

"Unless you'd like to try to change my opinion."

G blanched completely and turned to leave, the whole group following behind her, helping the injured D from the room.

That felt good. Not so much the fact that he had injured someone he hated. Just the momentary shedding of his mask. As important as L was, there were some parts of himself that he missed. Oh well. Sacrifices had to be made in order to gain…

B finished picking up his papers and returned to his L-crouch, picking up reading where he had left off.

Minutes later, Roger stormed into the mess hall like some gaunt, elderly tornado, catching B off guard. Roger never stormed. Heck, Roger rarely even left his office.

"B," he said in voice tainted with disappointment and restricted anger. "My office. Now."

B watched the man in horror. It wasn't because he thought he was in trouble, or going to be punished, but just the breaking of a years-long routine. Roger was supposed to sit behind his desk and tell B how much he was like L. He wasn't supposed to get angry and fling doors open.

It was the same kind of fear born of unfamiliarity that caused a bird in a new cage to messily loose its bowels and rip out its own feathers.

B followed silently, his facial expressions flickering between his own and L's in an attempt to try to grasp what was going on.

Upon reaching Roger's office, he was asked to sit in a chair adjacent to the desk: the chair he always sat in when receiving praise or testing his L-dialogue in a small-talk conversation. He hesitated for a moment, almost sitting normally instead of in a crouch.

"B, you are certainly mature enough to realize what you did to your classmate this evening and I will tell you right now: there will be no excuses."

B almost let his mask fall again in shock. Was he being reprimanded for hurting D? No one was ever reprimanded! This was ridiculous!

"You seriously injured him, B. Why would you do something like that?"

The black-haired teen turned his head slightly, clinging to his façade as it began to come undone for the second time that day.

"Why is this all the sudden an issue, Roger? Kids fight in here all the time. No one's ever done anything about it before."

"_Kids_ fight all the time. You are no longer a child, B. I thought you had left all that behavior behind you."

'All that behavior'? He meant B's self. And, yes, he had left it behind. He was L now. He had just made a mistake.

"You have amazing insight, B. You know who is a threat and who isn't. You also know when to stop if you need to defend yourself. Why didn't you?"

**_Crack._**

B jumped to his feet and glared at Roger.

"They wanted my notes."

Roger could not hide the shock in his eyes.

"This is all about not wanting to share a pack of papers?"

"A pack of papers?" B asked in an off-kilter voice. "Those are L's _thoughts_, Roger. They were given to me for a reason."

"They were given to you because you displayed impressive intelligence and maturity. Did we make a mistake? Because you showed neither of those things this evening."

B began to breathe heavily as if holding back tears.

"You don't understand! L would w-"

"This isn't about L," Roger said, raising his voice slightly. "This is about you." He paused and took on a gentler tone. "…Should I be worried, B?"

B didn't have an answer.

Roger sighed and rested his chin on his hands.

"Why don't you go back to your room? We'll deal with this further when you've calmed down."

B got up to leave, but Roger called to him a final time before he reached the door.

"I'm not angry at you, B. I'm just concerned. You can't be acting like that, especially if you're going to take on L's position."

---------------------------------------------------

As B made his way back to his room, his head was spinning.

What Roger had basically told him was that he was incompatible with L. That any shred of self he had left would sabotage him. And all the while his numbers had been glaring.

Where was the relief? It had been years. Why didn't he feel better by now?

He had worn L's clothes, his facial expressions, his voice… Why couldn't he fit into his mindset?

Unless…

No. No, that would mean everything he had worked for was useless.

That he had made a mistake.

L didn't make mistakes.

…

But, he wasn't L, was he?

He was some other miserable human being.

As much as he tried, as many corners as he shaved off, there was still no fitting a square peg into a round hole. For no matter how smooth the square became, it would never be a circle. It would just be a grossly disfigured shape left to stare at the pieces of itself it could never get back.

What made him so different? What made him so defective that his very being was an affront to L?

The eyes. It all came down to the eyes.

L never had to see the world the way B did. And he never would.

It was foolish of B to assume that L could handle his crisis.

He had made a revoltingly naïve mistake.

L would probably crack under such morbidity.

But not B.

B was still here despite the pain and the sorrow. Perhaps B had been the stronger one all along.

But B was in pieces. There was no way to gather and re-glue them all back together again.

That bastard had taken them. Hidden them away.

Well, he would just have to find substitutes. Pieces of L to hold himself together at the seams.

He would be a tortured, mismatched puzzle, but he would have the clarity of two conjoined souls.

The visual lucidity that was beyond his flesh, beyond his birthday…

And the cerebral perception of the faceless man who had robbed him of his identity…

In that moment, B threw out the name of his birth. The name he had wept at the loss of years ago.

It had been languishing in the back of his mental pantry for far too long and there was no doubt that the contents were now toxic.

He could never go back.

He threw out his meaningless letter. The name that linked him to A and the upheaval that the little runt had caused in his mind.

He never wanted to go back.

B gave himself a new title, birthed from the words of his frenzied revelation and the chimera of a being he would become.

Beyond Birthday.

**Author's Note: Thank you for reading! Please leave a review if you enjoyed or have suggestions for improvement! **


	7. Chapter 7

**Author's Note: Okay, first of all I want to acknowledge the inconsistencies and shoddy storytelling of the previous chapter. It was a bit of a rushed effort, and I do have every intention of revising it. The only problem is, when I sat down this evening to do just that, I drew a blank and wound up working on the next chapter instead. I know it is unwise to try to build off of a faulty foundation and I'm sorry. Therefore, I reach out to you, my kind readers, for help. Seriously, if you have any suggestions, me please send me a PM or something. Things are starting to get a bit stressful in my life right now because of work and the beginning of the semester, and I would hate to see this story take a nosedive because of my own laziness or incompetence. As a matter of fact, I may put continuation on hold until I can get what I've already written in order. So please, your input is more important now than ever. I don't mean to sound needy, I just don't want this to turn to crap. Thank you for your understanding, and thank you for reading this annoyingly long author's note.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own **_**Death Note**_** or any of the characters used in this story.**

"I'm worried, L," Roger said, sullenly sipping a cup of tea and turning his attention to the laptop before him. "B has not been acting himself lately."

"What makes you say that?"

"He injured another student. Not only that, but his reasons were irrational at best."

"What were his reasons?"

"He said he was protecting those notes you had us give him."

L's scrambled voice made a garbled sigh of acknowledgment.

"What do you recommend we do? He hasn't acted so unreasonably since his youth."

"You said he hasn't been acting himself, but maybe you are mistaken."

L paused and Roger could just imagine him lifting his thumb to his mouth in that common, pensive gesture of his.

"I knew it…" the prodigy muttered.

"Knew what?"

"We've been being played for quite some time now. The positive changes in B were nothing more than an illusion. He's worse than ever."

"But how could someone fake that kind of progress?"

Roger didn't want to hear what L was saying. B's achievements and somewhat pleasant manner were what allowed him to believe things were better at Wammy's. They allowed him to feel decent about what he was doing.

"You saw his scores. He's a very intelligent person, Roger. He obviously believed he had something to gain from becoming me."

It was in that moment that everything clicked in Roger's head. L was right. B hadn't been paying subtle homage to the detective like the other students did. He was literally trying to be L.

"That's why the papers bothered him so much…"

"Yes. Now the question is why he would go to such lengths. And when he will realize his folly…"

"How long have you known this was going on, L?"

"I've had my suspicions for almost a year and a half now. Why?"

Roger's heart sank at L's response.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't have enough evidence yet. I wouldn't want to worry you for nothing."

Evidence? Was this all just another case to L? Had Roger been wrong to assume the detective had actually begun to care?

"Why did you keep acting like you were going to choose him?"

"It was the easiest way to find out what I wanted to know. Now that I have confirmation, we can move on to our next option. It's a shame it had to work out this way, though. He was genuinely impressive. I would have liked to see him succeed."

"So that's it?"

"Hmm?"

"You're just giving up on him?"

"No, of course not. We will get him the help he needs. He's just no longer up for my title."

"Which is as good as saying you've given up on him. You know, I really thought you were different, L. I thought you had grown up and developed some sense of morality, but you're still out to serve yourself. B's not the one that had me tricked. You are."

"Roger… Regardless of how you feel, we do have a genuine situation on our hands. It won't be long before B, for lack of a better word, snaps."

"And you're okay with that? It's just another event to mark off on your calendar?"

"I never said that. I'm worried about the other residents. B is unpredictable, and if he has already displayed a tendency to harm others, it might be dangerous to let him stay around them at the moment."

"What are we going to do? Lock him in his room like a prisoner?"

"Sometimes simplicity _is_ best…"

"I can't believe this! Where's Watari? I need to speak with him immediately."

Roger knew it was hoping for too much to assume his 'friend' would take a more rational view on the matter, but he had to try.

There was a faint scuffling sound and some brief static before another scrambled voice made its way from the computer speakers.

"Hello?"

"Watari. Are you aware of what's going on?"

"Yes, and I support L's theory."

"Of course you do."

Roger hoped the cynicism in his voice translated accurately through the computer.

"You can't let your precious _assets_ get hurt while they still hold potential, can you?"

Watari sighed.

"Well, what would you suggest, Roger? Let B run amuck?"

Roger faltered.

"How do you know it's going to be as bad as you think? This is B we're talking about. Not some monster."

"You have a lot of nerve, Roger. Criticizing me for supporting L, and saying that I'm endangering others for his benefit, when you're doing the exact same thing. B is a hazard. Would you really expose the other students to a hazard just to make things easier for him?"

Roger held back fury so strong that it burned his throat. There was absolutely no way to compare this to what Wammy had done in opening the orphanage! Right?

Watari took on a calmer tone.

"You're lying to yourself if you think you don't value those close to you over others, Roger. Maybe now you'll realize that… But something must be done. We've given our suggestions. It's up to you to make the right decision."

The laptop screen went blank and Roger reached for his tea once more to find that it had gone as cold and tasteless as melted snow.

-------------------------------------------

Beyond Birthday sat cross-legged on the floor of his room with pieces of the wall heater spread out before him like broken toys.

It had been so difficult to take apart. All those wires and metal pieces. They had fit together so well…

Not anymore. No, no, no.

Now some of them were bent and snapped.

Some of them had left dents in the wall.

And some of them were on the ground outside his window.

He picked up one of the hollow internal parts and looked through it before throwing it violently against his closet door. It bounced off with a hollow clang and Beyond could not help but laugh.

So, which part of him was that?

It didn't matter.

He looked at L's papers, which were strewn across his desk, and managed a facial expression that was half-grin, half-scowl.

He got up, grabbed the papers with a flourish, and carried them to the disassembled hole in the wall where the heater had been. There were still some pieces sticking out at awkward angles and producing uninhibited heat.

The dial was lost. There was no longer a way to regulate the temperature.

Beyond crumpled one of the papers into a ball and held it to the overheating machinery.

Without a sound, the paper caught fire, creating an orange glow that reflected in Beyond's eyes.

He laughed again.

What was the matter? Paper with intelligent words could not fix a broken heater?

Beyond grabbed a handful of screws and bolts and tossed them into the blaze erupting from the appliance.

No good either. Perhaps more paper.

He repeated this pattern of tossing alternating objects into the inferno until the demented symbolism it held for him began to wear off and the blaze began to spread.

He guessed it was time to tell somebody about the fire.

-------------------------

Roger lifted his hand to knock on B's door, wanting to speak to the boy once more before making his decision, but before his knuckles could meet the wooden surface, the door swung open.

B stood in the doorway, silhouetted by a dangerous, orange glow, and smiled.

"I think my heater's broken, Roger."

**Author's Note: Thank you very much for reading, and please keep in mind what I said in the beginning author's note. Have a great night and a pleasant tomorrow.**


	8. Chapter 8

**Author's Note: I want to apologize for my little freak out last chapter. I have made revisions to chapter six, and my mind is much quieter now. You are all great sports for dealing with me, and I want you to know that it is much appreciated. I come bearing a short chapter this time, and depending on which direction I take, we might be getting close to the end. I have two separate plans on just how far to take this, one of them inspired by my reader Toph13139, and I haven't yet decided which one to go with yet. Thank you for reading, reviewing, and listening to my ramblings.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own _Death Note_ or any of the characters used in this story.**

A cold sweat began to form on Roger's brow the minute he closed the door behind him. He had told B that the empty room near the library was where he would be staying while they cleaned up the damage from the fire, but that was only half true.

Roger was struggling under the weight of his dilemma. There was now no doubt that something was seriously wrong, but he didn't want to admit it. He needed time to think. What were the options?

To send B away meant jeopardizing L. The teen knew way too much about the detective, and he was trapped in the same way that Roger was. On the other hand, he couldn't stay at Wammy's House. Not if he was going to break ankles and start fires. Maybe they could bring someone in? A psychiatrist or a counselor. But that would just open a whole other can of worms…

Roger turned the lock on the outside of the bedroom door and felt all the peace of mind he had gathered over the past few years disappear with a hollow click.

This was only until he could figure out what to do…

B must have heard the lock, because seconds later he called to Roger from within the room.

"Roger?" B asked in the same eerily calm tone of voice he had used when first learning of L. "Why did you just lock my door?"

Roger's breath caught in his throat as he frantically searched for an answer.

"I-I'm just taking precautions."

"Precautions? Against me?"

"Starting a fire is not normal, B. We can't take any chances."

Roger heard a laugh from behind the door. There was nothing abnormal or sinister about it. It just sounded like the occupant had remembered a funny joke.

"Everyone does strange things from time to time in the interest of catharsis, Roger. I just needed to vent some frustration. It won't happen again. I promise."

Roger wanted to believe that. He wanted to take those words as a binding contract, let B out, and crawl back into his belief that everything was okay.

"I'm sorry, B, but this is my only option right now."

"_Your_ only option?"

B's voice went silent just long enough to make Roger wonder if the question was rhetorical, but then he began to speak again using a familiar tone that Roger knew was not his own.

"Judging from your past behavior, Roger, the chances of you making this kind of decision are less than twenty percent. I'd say you're acting in the interest of someone else."

The similarity to L was genuinely frightening, as was the fact that this false tone was the one he had formed a friendship with.

"L told you to do this, didn't he?" B asked, his voice slipping back into his own.

"I am doing what is best for the orphanage as a whole."

"He thinks I'm dangerous. What happened to my potential, Roger? I thought I was going to become him?"

The mocking, childish pout B spoke with gave Roger the chills.

"That's what we all thought."

"I'm more than L, you know…" B stifled a giggle. "I'm more than me, more than L, yet still half a man. I've found myself, Roger. I've lost myself."

Were those the words of a philosopher or a madman? What had B been hiding under his façade for so many years?

"B, I'm walking away now."

"Don't do that."

Roger took a step and put his hands in his pockets to avoid their trembling.

"Don't leave, Roger!"

Another couple of steps.

"You can't do this to me! You know this is wrong! Let me _out_!"

Roger was now a few feet down the hallway.

"Think for yourself," B said, keeping the volume of his voice high, but switching into his L voice. "Committing an injustice to follow orders is sheer idiocy. Especially if you hurt a friend in the process."

Halfway down the hallway.

B's voice was now no longer distinguishable as words, just desperate, angry sounds.

----------------------------------------

Beyond Birthday turned to the only object in the room, a narrow bookcase filled with dictionaries, encyclopedias, and other large, boring reference books, and kicked it over.

He was still screaming even though he was certain Roger was gone. The fractured words and noises blasting from his throat expressed everything that he was, everything he used to be, and everything he would become.

In the strangled sobs of fear and abandonment there was the little boy carrying on in the back seat of a car and mourning for the blood-drenched corpse of the closest thing he had come to a friend.

In the harsh, desolate whispers of madness there was the boy tortured by vivid, airborne obituaries.

In the feral howls and shrieks there was the broken, scalding teenager, who no longer knew who or what he was.

And finally, in the silence there was Beyond Birthday.

----------------------------------------------

That bastard. All of them bastards.

Especially L.

Beyond knew how L thought, and he knew the conclusion he must have come to.

Beyond was only worth something when he was a casually-dressed, cake-eating mime.

The only person L could appreciate was himself.

Beyond didn't like that part of L. That part he would throw out. Only the best pieces to supplement himself.

Whoever that was.

L's betrayal felt like a cancer. A part of Beyond had turned on itself.

A was right to be afraid. It probably wouldn't stop until he was dead.

L was going to try to dispose of him.

That was the only logical thing to do.

Beyond couldn't let that happen, though.

L had to know that Beyond was more valuable than he was.

He had to see that the combination of L and B held more power.

No, no, no. L shouldn't come first in that statement.

L should come after B.

Maybe not even B, because B alone was not enough either.

Beyond Birthday.

L should come after Beyond Birthday.

But that couldn't happen if Beyond was dead.

He had to escape.

It wouldn't be that hard. The room had a window after all.

Stupid Roger.

Even without the threat of death, it was time for Beyond to leave Wammy's House. The memories it held weren't much to mourn anyway. This had been B's home, and then L's home, but he was no longer either of those people.

It was time to find somewhere for Beyond Birthday to lay his head.

**Author's Note: No, I don't think L was really planning on killing B. B's just being a bit paranoid. Roger lucked out though, huh? He didn't even need to make a decision. New chapter soon. My thanks to all my readers. Please leave a review if you have comments, questions, or suggestions. **


	9. Chapter 9

**Author's Note: This is it. The final chapter. Thank you to anyone who has followed me for this long. One of the goals I had when I started this story was to portray B in a way that would make Mello from "Dust and Mirrors" cringe and say "**_**That's**_** the guy I was looking up to?" I believe I accomplished that. This story has been fun, and I'm going to miss working on it. Thank you to everyone once again. Please enjoy. Time jump warning.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own **_**Death Note**_** or any of the characters used in this story. **

Beyond Birthday stood outside the large, Los Angeles home holding a waterproof fold-out map and a broken cell phone. He pretended to speak into the cell phone, asking the dead air about directions.

Splotches of rain from a coming storm pattered sporadically against the map, which Beyond wiped away as quickly as they fell. His eyes darted between the moistened map and the windows of the house.

As soon as the light in the bedroom turned on, it would be time to move.

Beyond had decided in his months of residence that Los Angeles was a miserable city. Too many people with too many numbers.

It had almost thrown him into a fit when he had stepped onto those busy streets for the first time and saw the sheer number of red digits. Back at Wammy's House, he usually saw no more than a couple dozen people a day, and he had all their numbers practically memorized. But here… Dying humans were everywhere. There was nowhere he could turn to avoid their numeric mortality.

He had managed to turn that into an advantage though. Or maybe it was one of his L pieces that had led to the formation of the plan…

Either way, using the names and numbers spread out before him, Beyond had devised a brilliant means of getting his message across to L.

And he was quite proud of himself.

He had been watching his victims for some time now, using a number of disguises. Sometimes he would be a lost traveler shouting to his girlfriend over the cell phone about faulty directions, sometimes he would be an astute businessman checking out real estate options, and sometimes he would be a young man dressed in jeans and a white shirt trying to keep the sun off of his pale face.

Tonight he had combined two of his favorites in what he felt was a very symbolic costume. He wore the jeans and the long-sleeved shirt in representation of L, yet he carried the accessories of the traveler to show his own spiritual disorientation.

A yellow light appeared in the bedroom window and Beyond felt his heart skip a beat. It was time.

He quickly checked for any observers and opened his faux travel bag to examine the tools he had brought along. Everything was in order. He pulled a tiny hypodermic needle from the perilous suitcase and hid it within the folds of the map.

He made a show of checking the address of the house confusedly as he picked the lock, being sure to spout out a few obscenities about his brother forgetting to leave the key under the mat, just in case anyone passed by.

The lock yielded to his skilled hands and the door swung open quietly.

Beyond closed the door behind him and made his way to the bedroom, moving only when the thunder outside rumbled.

He stood outside the bedroom door for what felt like forever, trying to calm his rapidly beating heart. With trembling hands he exposed the hypodermic needle, getting ready to strike immediately upon entering. He choked back a nervous giggle as he briefly imagined himself as a venomous snake.

3, 2, 1…

Beyond threw open the door and ran at the male writer inside.

The man had no time to scream or do anything more than widen his eyes in fear as Beyond plunged the needle into his arm.

In seconds, the man's eyes rolled back into his head and he fell unconscious onto the floor beside the bed.

Beyond stared down at the man and his incredibly low numbers and let the needle fall from his fingers.

Those numbers… the last time he had seen any so low… A was still alive…

A would be glad to know that Beyond had decided to drug his victims in his honor. None of them would ever have to feel what A felt in his final moments.

B turned to his bag and removed a strong, industrial kind of wire.

It was austere and unbreakable. Just like L.

L had led him to this. There was no need to feel guilty. B was innocent. It was L that was to blame.

Beyond wrapped the wire around the writer's neck and sucked in a deep breath before applying pressure.

He watched in horror and fascination as the man's body struggled to breathe, his chest shivering and his face turning a number of unnatural colors.

The numbers were almost at zero. He would actually see the numbers hit zero.

He felt like he was in Times Square on New Year's Eve, only instead of party noisemakers, there was the sound of pained gasping. Not all of it from his victim.

In an instant, Beyond saw the light fade from Believe Bridesmaid's bulging eyes and watched his chest go still.

Happy New Year.

Beyond let go of the wire and fell to his knees, saturated in a mixture of powerful emotions.

There was no time for reflection. He needed to follow through with the rest of his plan.

He grabbed a knife and removed his victim's shirt. It proved to be a rather difficult task, as the body was still coursing with residual spasms from dying nerves. Once the garment was removed, he began to carve the predetermined Roman numerals into the man's flesh.

It was much more enjoyable than the strangulation had been and both soothed Beyond and worked him into a frenzy. Blood splattered across his white shirt and covered his hands. This blood did not frighten him like A's had though. This blood was an achievement. It was a sign of progress.

Things were going to work out just fine.

Beyond let himself get carried away in his brutal actions and, for a moment, he felt a twinge of the indifference he had felt in his youth.

It was glorious.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Roger frowned at the American newspaper before him and felt the color drain from his face.

He had found B.

It had to be him.

The Wara Ningyo Murders…

B had become a murderer.

Roger had been right in the beginning. He never should have gotten his hopes up. There was nothing good about Wammy's House.

He should have gotten out while he could. He should have just driven back to his old house on that day so many years ago. Maybe then B would have had a chance at a normal life, and Roger would not be tortured by the guilt of so many ruined young lives.

A new group of children was already scheduled for transfer to the orphanage and Roger felt pity and an odd kind of hatred for them. As terrible as their circumstances were, he would be the one who had to watch them suffer. He would have to sit in his office and balance the checkbooks as their lives spiraled into the same madness that had B's had.

But there was no escape. There was nothing he could do.

He picked up the telephone on his desk to call L. The detective had to know about the murders in L.A…. If he didn't know already.

But before Roger could finish dialing L's number, the dial tone went dead.

The old man glanced out the window just in time to see a flaming branch fall from the large tree in the courtyard. It hit the ground with a crack as lightning creased the dark skies.

What a nasty storm this would be.

**Author's Note: And that's that. We all know what happens next. I wanted B to initially experience a lot of emotion during his first murder because, in my opinion, a murderer who feels is a lot scarier than one who doesn't. Thank you for reading. Please leave a review if you have anything to say. I don't know what I'm going to be working on next. I did start posting a series of humorous ficlets about the young Wammy's boys, but that's more of a side thing than a serious project. We'll just have to wait and see what pops into my head. I don't have any victory jam for the conclusion of this story like I had victory chocolate at the end of "Dust and Mirrors". I don't really like jam too much… except on baguette with brie… and that's too expensive to splurge on right now. Also, it's like two in the morning. Sorry, B. **


End file.
